Euchre

What Is Euchre?

Euchre is a trick-taking card game for four players in two partnerships, played with a 24-card deck. Each hand, one team chooses trump and must win at least three of the five tricks, and the first team to 10 points wins. You can play euchre online free right here, with a computer partner against two computer opponents.

Once trump is chosen, two Jacks, the right and left bowers, become the top two trumps. The players who chose trump are the makers, and if they take fewer than three tricks they are euchred and the other side scores 2. The euchre glossary defines every term on this page.

In our game you sit South with your partner North across the table. You deal the first hand, the deal passes to the left after every hand, and the end of each hand shows both teams' tricks and the running score.

Euchre Rules at a Glance

How to Play Euchre

The euchre rules fit in seven steps, and then the deal passes one seat to the left until a team reaches 10 points.

1. Deal five cards each. The dealer gives every player five cards, starting on the left. Most tables deal packets of three and two; our game deals one card at a time. The last four cards form the kitty.
2. Turn up the top card of the kitty. This up-card proposes a suit for trump.
3. Order it up or pass. Starting on the dealer's left, each player either accepts the up-card's suit as trump or passes. If anyone accepts, the dealer picks up the up-card and discards one card face down.
4. Name another suit in round two. If all four pass, the up-card is turned down and its suit is out. Each player in turn may name one of the other three suits. Our game always sticks the dealer, who cannot pass; many tables throw the hand in and redeal instead.
5. Go alone, if you choose. The player who makes trump may declare a loner when making it. Their partner lays their cards face down and sits out the hand.
6. Play five tricks. The player on the dealer's left leads. Follow suit if you can; if you cannot, play any card, including a trump. The highest trump wins the trick, or the highest card of the suit led if nobody trumps, and the winner leads next.
7. Score the hand. The makers score 1 point for three or four tricks, 2 for all five, and 4 for all five alone. If they take two or fewer, they are euchred and the defenders score 2. The first team to 10 points wins.

5 cards

West

5 cards

North (partner)

5 cards

East

3 face down + up-card

Kitty

You (dealer)

In the deal above you are the dealer, as you always are in the first hand of our game. West, North, and East pass, and you pick up the King of hearts and discard the 10 of spades, leaving yourself with no spades at all. The game will not let anyone play a card that breaks the follow-suit rule, so a renege, which usually costs 2 points at a card table, never happens here. The full euchre rules play this exact hand out trick by trick and cover misdeals, reneges, and the house rules many groups add.

Euchre Card Rankings: Right and Left Bower

The right bower, the Jack of the trump suit, is the highest card in euchre. The left bower, the other Jack of the same color, ranks second and counts as a trump for the whole hand. Below them come the Ace, King, Queen, 10, and 9 of trumps, so the trump suit holds seven cards.

The other three suits rank Ace, King, Queen, Jack, 10, 9, except that the suit of the same color as trump has lost its Jack.

The Jack of diamonds follows hearts

With hearts as trump, if the Ace of diamonds is led and you hold the 9, Queen, and Jack of diamonds, you must play the 9 or the Queen: the Jack belongs to hearts now. If a heart is led and the Jack of diamonds is your only trump, you must play it.

Nothing beats the right bower, so holding it is worth a trick in every hand you play. Both bowers together are worth two, since only the right bower outranks the left.

Euchre Scoring

The makers need three of the five tricks to score, and a fourth trick adds nothing; only a march, all five tricks, raises the score. The defenders score only by euchring the makers.

The first team to 10 points wins, and the game ends with the hand that gets a team there, so a loner march from 7 finishes on 11. Tables in Britain, Wisconsin, Australia, and New Zealand often play to 11 instead.

At a card table each team keeps score with two spare low cards: a 6 and a 4 in Ohio and Indiana, two 5s in Michigan and Canada. One card lies face up, the other covers part of it, and sliding the top card uncovers one more pip for each point. The rules page shows how to keep score with two cards. Our game keeps the score on screen.

Going Alone in Euchre

The player who makes trump can go alone, with their partner's cards face down for the hand, and a loner who takes all five tricks scores 4 points instead of 2.

Go alone when you hold three sure tricks and a real chance at the other two: the point is already safe, and a march pays 4 instead of 2. Stay with your partner on 8 or 9, where a march or any single point already wins.

In our game you are the only player who can call a loner: press Alone when you order up or name trump. The computer players never go alone, so you never have to defend against one. The player on the dealer's left leads the first trick; if that player is the loner's partner, the next player leads, as some printed rulebooks have it. Many tables give the opening lead to the player on the loner's left instead. Defending alone for 4 points, and the Canadian loner rule that makes a dealer's partner who orders up play alone, are house rules our game does not use.

Euchre Strategy

Count on about two tricks from your own hand and one from your partner before you make trump. It is only an average: five tricks shared by four players come to 1.25 each, and on some hands your partner brings none.

• Know your seat. First seat, on the dealer's left, hands the opposing dealer a trump if it orders up. Second seat, the dealer's partner, puts the card in its own partner's hand. Third seat has the dealer playing after it and needs the surest hand. In our game your seat moves one place every hand.
• Deal with purpose. As dealer, pick it up more often than not, never turn down a bower unless you can stop every other suit, and discard to leave yourself void in a suit. When you are stuck, pick a suit in which you hold a card or two rather than one you are void in.
• Lead trump to your partner's call, even a single low trump, unless your partner was the stuck dealer. If you made trump and hold the right bower, lead it; against the opponents' trump, a lone off-suit Ace is the usual lead.
• Call next from first seat. If the dealer turns the up-card down, first seat is expected to name the other suit of the same color, called next, because by passing, the dealer's side has shown it probably lacks that color's Jacks. The dealer's partner leans the other way, toward a suit of the other color, called reverse next.
• Play to the score. On 8 points a march already wins, so keep your partner in. When the opponents sit on 8, a euchre hands them the game; when they sit on 9, they win with any point, so call more freely.

Do not trump your partner's winning Ace

In the deal above, West leads the King of spades, your partner takes it with the Ace, and East follows. You play last with no spades: throw the 9 of clubs and save your trumps.

The euchre strategy guide covers ordering up seat by seat, the dealer's discard, defense, and the mistakes to avoid.

Euchre Variations: Two, Three, and Six Players

Our game deals standard four-player euchre, the form the classic rule books call the most popular, but euchre has well-known forms for other tables:

• Two players. The oldest method deals five cards each and makes trump the usual way. The most-described modern layout gives each player 12 cards, four face down with four face up on top of them and four in hand, and the player who makes trump needs 7 of the 12 tricks.
• Three players (cutthroat). Whoever makes trump plays alone against the other two, who team up for that hand.
• Five players. Some forms add cards and let the maker pick a partner for the hand by calling a card.
• Six players. Two teams of three, with extra cards added to the pack.
• British euchre. A Joker called the Benny joins the pack as the highest trump, making 25 cards, and games usually run to 11.
• Bid euchre and Pepper. An auction replaces the up-card, and the high bidder names trump.

The variants page gives full two-handed euchre rules and three-handed euchre rules. Spades and Bid Whist are also four-player partnership games with a bidding round, and both play here with a computer partner.

Where Euchre Originated

Card historians trace euchre to Jucker, a game from Alsace and the Palatinate on the French-German border, carried to America by German immigrants; even the word bower comes from Bauer, the German name for the Jack. The earliest known American mention, spelled "eucre", appears in 1810 in a gaming-house scene in The Savage, a book published in Philadelphia, and the actor Joe Cowell recalled learning "uker" on a Mississippi steamboat in 1829.

In 1864 The American Hoyle called euchre the favorite American game. Euchre also gave the pack its Joker: an extra top trump sold as the Best Bower or Imperial Bower, first described in printed rules in 1868. Bridge overtook euchre around 1900, yet it is still played across the American Midwest and Ontario, and in Britain it survives in Cornwall and on Guernsey. The history of euchre covers progressive euchre parties and a New York charity tournament of 1898 billed for 2,000 players.

Frequently Asked Questions